Sony loses money from smartphone unit, games and movie divisions turn a profit

Sony posted a first quarter net profit of $261 million, which is a sliver of good news for the hardware giant who has had to sell off assets to stem the tide of losses last year. Operating profit at 69.8 billion yen ($680 million) for the quarter was nearly double that of what the manufacturer achieved during the same period last year.

Strong sales of Sony's latest console, the PlayStation 4, along with mainstream success of movies like The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and 22 Jump Street were the main reasons for Sony's profitable quarter.

As for the manufacturer's Xperia smartphone business, things aren't looking any better, as Sony has posted a loss of 2.7billion yen ($26 million) for the quarter. As a result, the manufacturer slashed its sales forecast for this year from a projected 50 million to 43 million units. Even after a significant consumer interest in devices like the Xperia Z2, Sony has not managed to turn a profit from the mobile unit, citing a waning demand for smartphones as the main cause for the less than stellar sales.

Even though the first quarter was profitable, Sony is estimated to accrue around $487 million in losses over the course of the year as the manufacturer restructures its business units.

Reader comments

Sony loses money from smartphone unit, games and movie divisions turn a profit

Shame, their smartphones and tablets are excellent devices, sure they cost a bit more but like all Sony products they are premium quality and work perfectly. Maybe they need to stop releasing an upgrade every six months and focus on advertising their current models more.

Actually our economy is not the end all be all. Yes it is the staple economy due to history, however Germany, the UK, Japan, and China all have very strong economies that would allow for strong growth and financial independence.

The last five iPhones look the same (with a change in aspect ratio halfway through). The last three Galaxy S-es look about the same (the S5 being a little different). The last couple of LG phones look the same. What of it?
Also the US isn't the only market on the planet, nor the biggest. Granted, they could get a lot of demand, but maybe they don't have the resources to make a phone for each individual carrier, and then there's the fact that some US carriers are still using CDMA... Point is, whenever I read about US carriers, it just confuses me. I'd avoid selling phones there if I could avoid it. :P

What? another android oem losing money? You mean to tell me android is not the savior we all thought it was. This is for those who kept yelling for Nokia to go android, there is only one oem that's been making on android and we all know who?

Nokia would have done well in the early stages when they owned the dumbphone market. Since they have gone the Amazon route of removing Google from Android and creating a crap phone for that purpose they deserve to be sold into oblivion. It was an interesting strategy that MS had there (create a very bad Android phone to taint the image) to corrupt Android from within.

I dunno... I never hear anything good when it comes to the mobile market in the US, except that it's big, which is only good if (the OEM) can afford to accommodate for it. The options seem to be 1. Be Apple, and have the carriers bow to you, or 2. Make variants of the phone for both GSM and CDMA, as well as SKUs for each carrier because of bloatw-- I mean carrier software, or even different radios because they want it to only support the LTE bands they use...
So um... maybe, but they might not be able to afford it, especially if it's for more than one carrier. Maybe if they didn't release two flagships a year, they could put a little more resources aside for a US SKU. :/

Gee I wonder why. Sony throws devices out like Samsung did to see what sticks. Instead of a high end phone every 6 months with hardly any change release one a year like everyone else. Also they need to be more competive on pricing, come on Sony over $700 for a Z2?

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